My English Country Garden Blog
I am a 50 year old mother of two, a retired solicitor and Jane Austen obsessive. I love my garden, my husband , my children, my cat …and Jane Austen. Not necessarily in that order according to mood. Here I’ll be sharing my thoughts of other gardens, old recipes and garden writers with you, from William Lawson via Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte to Nancy Mitford.Flower Brick Friday Number 8: Velvet Roses
This week’s flowerbrick shows the last of my old roses. The rain has done for those that remain and so I have to wait for another year before they appear again…
It is quite a bitter sweet time because I adore them…..
As you know well ;-)
This week’s Isis Ceramics flowerbrick is manganese pink and Palladian and shows an English Villa complete with deer park and deer.
I just want one of these garden pavilion tents! Not much good in our wet climate ,but still…….Id live with the mildew ;-)
This weeks rose is a Gallica, Tuscany Superb.
This is a sport of Tuscany , the Old Velvet Rose that I wrote about here. It differs in that is has far more petals, and as a result we lose sight of some of the golden stamens.
I like it very much nevertheless .
It has the richest fragrance .
I put the flowerbrick in my dining room and within minutes the room was completely perfumed with this heady and rich rose fragrance from only five blossoms. Delightful.
The pale blue froth that surrounds it is Ceanothus Glorie de Versailles, Californian Lilac.
This should be grown in full sun,but mine is in a border that is mostly shady and quite dry. In my defence I had no other space in which to grow it..and I wanted it very, very much.(You know that feeling, don’t you?I thought so….)
It thrives.
The only problem I have with this shrub is that in winter it is semi-evergreen.
That means it dosen’t lose all its leaves and frankly-how can I put this delicately?-it looks a mess.
I’d much rather it lost its leaves to leave behind the framework of stems which are slightly pink in colour and attractive. But in the winter they are obscured by odd leaves. clining on and getting ragged. Ah well….
It looks lovely in flower arrangements and if it is kept cool it lasts well. And as there is no taboo on this lilac being brought indoors( if there is please don’t enlighten me!) I am happy to have it here.
And so..all that remains for me to say is …Happy Friday!
A trip back in time to meet Jane Austen’s Aunt……
Well, nearly ;-) All will be explained below…(and do remember all the pictures can be enlarged by clicking on them)
This week I visited Easton Walled Garden and I thought you might like to virtually visit along with me.
These gardens are a very different garden to those normally open to the public, all pristine and perfect. These are in the process of being rescued. They were once rather magnificent.: go here to see. Franklin D Roosevelt and his new wife Eleanor spent some of their honey moon here in 1905 ,and I can just imagine them in Edwardian dress wandering along the terraces in the evening light.
The mansion which the gardens complimented was demolished in 1951. This, I think, is all that remains of it:
It had been requisitioned in the war and it was thought too expensive a process to repair and maintain it. So it went.
The estate and the gardens,along with the stables, some garden buildings and some of the walls sourrounding the garden were all that was left.
In 2001 the current owners - it is in its 14th generation of continuous ownership- decided to attempt to restore the gardens which were overgrown and unrecognisable .
I have to admire their courage. It is going be a long and expensive process. if I were them I would be seeking out sponsorship deals from the large plant suppliers/nurseries ;-)
The garden is set in 100 acres of magnificent parkland, in rolling countryside . The walled garden is 12 acres in area. It’s setting is magnificent.
Looking from the point where the house stood we see before us a valley down to the River Witham and across to the rising bank on the other side .This valley is very, very steep and the side facing the river has been terraced. (sadly, now not really planted up with anything but long grasses) In order to reach the river you can use a flight of steps,or either one of two paths leading down the vertiginous slopes. I took the steps. My 11 year old son, needless to say, rolled down the slope……
Spanning the river is a beautiful stone bridge
The river Witham is not particularly wide at this point but it is quite overcrowded with reeds : another job for the brave owners to tackle..one day.
On this bank are embryonic mixed borders
either side of the Yew Tunnel, which was once just a row of topiraied trees….
And an interesting weeping holly tree:
Patterns are cut into the long grass,
leading to the delicious buildings set into the walls.
This one , the Tool Store, leans rather alarmingly…
This is a grain store decorated with the appropriate heraldic emblem of the owners family-
a wheatsheaf- in carved limestone.
This is the beautiful apple Store.
William Larkins, Mr Knightley’ s bailiff in Emma would no doubt approve ;-)
After ascending the steep hill back across the river the areas around the remaining buildings are a riot of colour to explore.
There is a pickery (a cutting garden)
filled with sweet peas
and annuals of every type.
There is also a vegetable garden
And no proper vegetable garden of this age would be complete without a hive
and an auricula theatre,( denuded of auriculas at this time of year)
again sporting the wheatsheaf emblem of the family.
The family who own this estate are named Cholmeley ( pronounced “chumley”). Their connection with Jane Austen was through her aunt by marriage, Jane Leigh Perrot nee Chomeley.
She was a niece of Montague Cholmeley who owned Easton . His initials or those of his his son , also named Montague, are emblazoned on much of the exisiting garden ironomngery: here on a set of grand gates leading to the park
and here on a smaller gate along the river side.
Jane Leigh-Perrot was born in Barbados but was educated at a boarding school in England and spent muchof her holidays here at Easton with her uncle and his family. She married James Leigh- Perrot, who was Mrs Austen’s brother.
Jane Austen’s aunt was of course infamous for being charged with grand larceny- an attempt, seemingly at blackmail, by some Bath haberdashers meant that in 1799 she was accused of stealing a quantity of lace.
If found guilty she would no doubt have been transported to Botany Bay in Australia for 14 years- a virtual death sentence of a woman of her age.
When she was incarcerated in Ilchester Gaol awaiting trial at Taunton, Montague Cholmeley wrote her a series of kind letters to her to help maintain her spirits. Here is an extract from one commenting on Mrs Austen’s generous but slightly deranged offer to have Jane and Cassandra accompany their aunt in the gaol( in reality Jane Leigh-Perrot lived together with her husband in the squalid but humane lodgings with the Gaol Keeper and his family and not in a jail cell. Mrs Leigh Perrot declined the offer, recoiling in horror at the thought of the Austen girls having to spend time there. Montagu appeared to agree with her decision:
You tell me that your good sister Austen has offered you one or both of her Daughters to continue with you during your stay at that vile place. ,but you decline the kind offer as you cannot procure them Accommodation in the House with you and you cannot let those Elegant Young Women be your Inmates in a Prison nor be subject to the inconveniences which you are obliged to put up with….
Anyone who called Jane Austen “elegant” was OK in my books …
Jane Leigh Perrot was found not guilty. And I’m not sure that Jane Austen had much affection for her aunt, certainly from the evidence of her letters, but in any event, viewing the place where Jane’s aunt spent her early summers was an interesting way to spend a summer’s afternoon, speculating on her character while wandering around.
And I find the prospect of these gardens being fully restored bewitching: but even in their present state -much akin to a half finished archaeological dig-they exert a certain charm , and evoke memories of eras long gone.
Bilbo: In Memorium
Poor Bilbo the Gnome is missing, lost in the post.
He has been in transit for 4 weeks now and so after frantic searches and much angst we have reluctantly come to the conclusion that the postal services have once again created and not solved a problem.
The Dirt Princess has managed to find three more Golden Gnomes and turning adveritsy to triumph is going to hold a competition to see which one of them-Bizzle, Bitsy or Bingles-is going to carry on in Bilbo’s grand tradition and visit FlowerGardenGirl ( who should be the next recipient of Bilbo on his travels).
I will be sending both the Dirt Princes and FlowerGardenGirl some gardening related goodies to express my sadness at the loss of Bilbo (I’m so unhappy it happened on my watch) and my thanks for their gracious response to my dilemma. They have both been terribly understadning and kind.
And Jane Austen,with whom you remember Bilbo stuck up quite the friendship, is inconsolable.
Rousing herself from depths of her mourning, she managed today to pen this tribute to her lost love: (in imitation of her final verse- When Winchester Races) (mind you the uncharitable amongst us would say she is telling the Dirt Princess an entirely different story….the minx. A-hem…..Who is to be believed?)
One thing is certain…..She will never be the same again……but perhaps we will get another novel out of all this. In the meantime here is her poem…..
When Bilbo’s travels first took their beginning
It is said that good gardeners forgot post office complaints.
By not formally applying for permission to travel could be interpreted as sinning,
And the Post Master’s approval was faint.
The travels however were fixed and determined.
Bilbo came and the Weather was charming.
He and Miss Austen were satin’d and ermined
And no body saw any future alarming
But when the Post Master was informed of their doings
He made but one spring from his chair
Which ought by rights to lie sadly in ruins.
And he addressed Bilbo and Miss Austen standing there….
“Oh! Subjects Amourous! Oh Venus depraved!
When once things are posted you think they are safe
But behold me immortal; by Vice you’re enslaved
Bilbo you have sinned and must suffer, you waif…
“These teas and revels and dissolute measures
With which you’ve been debasing a Lincolnshire plain
Let them stand. You shall meet with my curse in your pleasures
The parcel will go missing, Bilbo will rue that he came.
Ye cannot know my command over the post.
Henceforth I’ll triumph in shewing my powers!!
Your parcel shall never arrive at the home of its prospective hosts
The curse upon Bilbo is to languish unknown for hour and hours……
all that will remain will be a bed of flowers.
She will never be the same …..forget those rumours of romance with Tom Lefroy or a lost love in Sidmouth: Bilbo was the man.
Purple reigns….
with apologies to Prince or The Artist Formerly Known as ” Squiggle”.
A few weeks ago white was the dominant colour in the main garden.
Now it is purple.
The Badly Pruned Hebe -which is massive, almost 12 feet tall and 8 feet wide -
has strikingly lovely racemes of flowers which begin life deep purple and
then they fade not to grey (enough with the pop music references I hear you cry! ..Oh, OK, then) but to white.
It has the most deliciously strong fruity smell and is a haven for bees.
Just listen to them…
doneNo shortage of bees in my garden at present.
The buddelias are of course calling out to the butterflies(and the bees)….
And though buddleias are supposed to attract buterflies, its the anenome japoinca leaves in this border are also calling to them at the moment…I wonder why?
There are two buddlieas in the borders either side of the entrance to the Long Rose and Lavender Borders.
I have no idea what they are called,
…as they were kindly given to me as two rooted slips by my old gardener (now retired).
One has flowers of deep purple, (yes….I’m resisting the urge to go musical….)the other is pale lilac and has silvery green leaves.
The strong honey scent of these two bushes is fabulous (despite the fact that …I don’t like honey….low be it spoken)
Either side of the entrance to the gazebo I have two massive bushes of purple sage,which never ever flower……
and to the left of the gazebo, an herbacious clematis- Clematis. jouiniana Praecox- is spreading and scrambling about.
I love these herbaceous clematis and this one holds fond memories for me: it was brought from the now sadly defunct Dingley Dell plant nursery near Stamford in Lincolnshire, where I used to love to go to root out rare plants and have a picnic with my daughter in the beautiful gardens there, when she was tiny before she began school.
Still, whenever I look at the plants I bought from there I remember the fun we used to have…
So all is not quite lost …..;-)
Lavender’s blue, dilly-dilly
…lavender’s green
When you have taken 500 cuttings
You shall be…exhausted ;-)
…to paraphrase the old nursery rhyme, here shown above in the version from The Baby’s Opera illustrated by our friend Walter Crane.
I’ve done it.
It’s taken three days on and off but I’ve finally taken 500 cuttings of lavendua angustifoia to replace the lavender bushes which make up my lavender eding in the Long Rose and Lavender border.
I need 200 I think, so in the typical manner of someone with appalling maths ability I’ve doubled it and added some for insurance purposes. I can’t help it : I am a lawyer by training,I’m naturally cautious just like dear old Mr Shepherd in Persuasion…
Mr. Shepherd, a civil, cautious lawyer, who….would rather have the disagreeable prompted by any body else
I hear you Mr Shepherd, I hear you…;-)
If anyone wants to know how to take lavender cuttings then here is a quick primer ;-)
First, catch your lavender as dear old Hannah Glasse would say :
Select a side shoot
…and pull it from the main stem, ensuring you have a little bit of the bark from the stem remaining: this is called the “heel”
Keep taking as many cutting as you require, storing those you have already taken in a plastic bag, as this helps to lessen the chance of the cuttings drying out (fatal).
Then prepare your working area, and fill a pot with compost…
I use John Innes Number One.
Take your cuttings from the bag.
And strip the lower leaves…..
… from the cutting.
At this point some people use hormone rooting power : I don’t.
Stick the cutting down into the compost, around the side of the pot. This helps encourage the cuttings to root.
Water the pot.
Cover with a plastic bag (I use food bags )
Secure with an elastic band and repeat and repeat…till you have enough
Put in a shady spot. Check on them occasionally till they root, which is usually indicated by them making new growth from the tip of the cutting. You dont really need to tear them out of the compost to check the root system ;-)
Eventually, pot on. And plant out…which is my job next spring, if all goes well. Fingers crossed, chaps.
Then go an sit down in the company of a well deserved glass and a good book.
Your work for today is done ;-)
What dreadful hot weather we have! …
…It keeps one in a continual state of inelegance.
So said Jane Austen in a letter to her sister Cassandra written on the 18th September, 1796.
I entirely sympathise, Madam.
We are having a similar season of weather : the heat and most awfully the humidity has been high and constant which is unusual for England ,and certainly is hard to endure for such a protracted period of time. Having to attend all the crazed events associated with the end of school term and trying hard to look respectable as Head Girl’s mother should, has been incredibly hard. (Well, it would be difficult for me to achieve elegance at any time of the year but the past two weeks the elements have conspired to put this goal way beyond my reach)
The garden has begun to wilt and the grass is becoming, in parts, parched and brown. The silty soil is setting like concrete. Woe is me…..
So today I turn my back on the sun, the heat and the inelegance of it all.
And I will look back to the winter,when my garden was iced ….
….and cooly elegant……
…and we could go outside and make snow angels…
under the bemused eye of the cat …
So let’s all quickly put on our virtual wellies and wooly hats ,scarves and gloves….and take a tour round the winter garden…
Come on, hurry up!
..it might soon begin to melt!
..through the trees…..
Along the iced lollipop trees of the Evergreen Oak Avenue…
..to the Cutting Roses Garden…..
Into Narnia………
Where is Mr Tumnus?”
To the Old Rose Garden……
Look at the tracks we have made…..
I’m not sitting on that bench today…..I must shake the snow from the weeping standards soon…or they will break……
Not a sign of one Iris……
And the Crab Apples are frosted……
The Long Rose and lavender Border is almost impassable (LOL)…
So..let’s go back to the house..Im feeling cold now..my toes are aching…..
That’s better: much warmer….
Flower Brick Friday Number 7: Smelly Vision Required
I wish the boffins at WordPress could give me the gift of smelly-vision.
Then I could share with you the heady perfume of these sweet peas. It is currently billowing out from the confines of my ground floor cloakroom.
Who needs artificial air fresheners, she asked almost indelicately……..
They are just now coming into bloom in the Evergreen Oak Avenue, where they are growing amongst the clematis.
Mostly they are the old grandiflora type but some seeds must have been mixed up at the seed warehouse, for some most definitely are modern sweet peas.(*sounds off of teeth grinding*)
Oh well……best laid plans of mice and men…etc., etc.
The flowerbrick this week again is a confection designed by Deborah Sears of Isis Cermaics.
It show some 17th century sportsmen out duck shooting…..
But worry not for the ducks are hiding to one side…Shhh..if they keep quiet they will escape the guns……..who will have to return to their castle empty-handed to eat suckling pig or roast beef instead.
The sweet peas are , Painted Lady (pink and white)
Cupani ( purple and maroon)
Mrs Collier (creamy white)
And the deep navy blue of Lord Nelson:
I have no idea what is the name of the stripy, specked, pink sweet pea ……..but I know its modern.
To fill in the gaps I’ve used my favourite alchemilla mollis , the flower arranger’s friend ;-) With delicate flowers like sweet peas it helps to “prop ” them up so that they do not flop and fall out of the holes in the flower brick.
And so now I await the outcome of the weather forecast with trepidation…thunderstorms are said to be headed towards us. With all the tremendous humidity and heat of the past week if they do occur they will be tremendously violent…and so begins the first day of my children’s summer holiday. I knew I shouldn’t have brought that paddling pool….
So…what else grows in the Old Rose Garden?
Lots, frankly.
There is, as you know, not much space to spare because the roses take up 98 % of it, but I do try to add other plants to vary the interest.
The honeysuckles on the arches flower at different times .
I grow clematis to provide some flowers during and after the main rose flowering time.
Here we have Clematis viticella Prince Charles in full bloom.
This is the best it has ever been and the plant is three years old.
Ive also planted four purple clematis viticella–I cant remember its name-one in each quadrant: they are beginning to scramble among the roses,as I want them to do. Hopefully next year there will be some more of the same.
I planted them only last year so I shouldn’t expect too much this year, I suppose ;-(..but I always do expect a lot of my plants…..*sigh* I am a very impatient gardener, in truth. Is this the gardener’s lament-“Next year it will be better?”
We also have three varieties of Campanula lactiflora, Pritchards Variety, Loddon Anna and the ordinary pale blue.
This is Loddon Anna which is a kind of grey-pink.
And mixes well with dark wine coloured roses…
The ordinary pale blue variety….
Which is not really ordinary but is terribly pretty.
And finally the dark blue Pritchard’s Variety…
Graham Stuart Thomas thought it was the best perennial to use in conjunction with old roses and I think that in the main he was right: its pale but complimentary colours and size make it a good foil.
And finally but by no means least,we have -ta-raa – two plants of Crambe Cordifolia finally (finally!) flowering.
I have lost count of the times Ive planted this partuclar plant and loved lived hopefully but have finally lost. I think they may have been victim of slugs and snails…but this year two have survived and have put up their fabuous froth of small white flowers.
There should be two in each quadrant of the Old Rose Garden,but the other six have not made it. Ah well…….
In the border behind the stone bench the two buses of rosa primula continue to give out their lovely scent: some anenome japonicas have yet to bloom, and two bushes of Rosa wichuraiana Veilchenblau are slowly growing( they have been the victim of an enthusiastic but erroneous garden helper who has pruned them to within an inch of their lives).
I love the parma violet colour of the flowers,but would never really say they are blue ;-)
So yes, other plants do grown in that part of the garden ;-) And later in the summer we shall be back to discover some more…..
Great Aunt Twissie’s Lavender Sticks.
At rare moments in your life you meet a very special person, and their memory remains with you always.
My great aunt Twissie was one such person. She died when she was in her 80s when I was eight years old but I have never forgotten her love or the gifts she gave me: and mostly these were not material things(but she used to send me a wonderful Christmas Pracel every year). No, mostly they were happy memories which were priceless, and also ways of doing, or making things.
Here she is dressed in Elizabethan garb for a Masquerade Ball held in Warwickshire in 1932.
That sweet gentle expression was always on her face, though as a nurse in the field hospitals of First World War France she must have been witness to many horrors. She never talked about that to me.
No, from her I learnt about many plant and wild flowers on our regular walks through her garden or the border countryside: she lived in Monmouthshire and loved the country.
She adored lavender and her garden- which was set out rather like Mr McGregor’s garden in Peter Rabbit-was mostly a mix of vegetable and flower beds set amid stony paths. The main paths were edged with lavender and it always makes me think of her.
She was also a person fascinated with history and the old ways of doing things…..I suppose a lot of her rubbed off on me on my visits to her ;-)
She was the type of person a child adored because you just knew she loved you. Totally and utterly and unconditionally. She didn’t have children of her own, but she understood them perfectly. She adored my father and me, and we both had superbly happy memories of her kindness and sense of fun.
Her linen always smelt of lavender. And not because she made lavender bags. No, she made lavender sticks.
She taught me how to make them: she claimed they were Elizabethen,,,…but now, Im not sure about that ;-)
And as the lavender in my Iris Rainbow Garden is in bloom I thought I might share with you the useful way of preserving them…no needlwork skills needed( although Aunt Twissie had those in abudnance).
Let’s try….as modelled here by my Dear Daughter and her beautifully manicured fingernails ;-)
First cut ( making the stems as long as you can) 18 stems of lavender.
Then strip the lavender of all its lower leaves…
Bunch them together….
…then tie them ,preferably with wool, tight but not too tight, just under the heads of the lavender flowers.
Carefully pull the stems back on themselves to form a “cage” around the heads of lavender.
Take care to arrange the stems so that they are evenly spaced around the blooms.
Tie the ends with wool (again preferrably green) and then cover with a pretty thin ribbon.
Ta-raaa!
Put in a dark place to dry and then put them about your linen. As I do to remember Great Aunt Twissie :-)
A Visit to Mansfield Park
Mary Crawford knew a good thing when she saw it.
Tom Bertram must have been thought pleasant, indeed, at any rate; he was the sort of young man to be generally liked, his agreeableness was of the kind to be oftener found agreeable than some endowments of a higher stamp, for he had easy manners, excellent spirits, a large acquaintance, and a great deal to say; and the reversion of Mansfield Park, and a baronetcy, did no harm to all this. Miss Crawford soon felt that he and his situation might do. She looked about her with due consideration, and found almost everything in his favour: a park, a real park, five miles round, a spacious modern–built house, so well placed and well screened as to deserve to be in any collection of engravings of gentlemen’s seats in the kingdom, and wanting only to be completely new furnished…..
Now it just might have been that Cottesbrooke Hall where I went today with my Dear Daughter, on a natural high after watching The Boss perform a storming set at Glastonbury, was the inspiration for Mansfield Park. Just the building not the whole book, although it is possibly too old, being first built in 1702 to qualify as a modern house. ;-)
Jane Austen as far as we are aware never visited Northamptonshire where Cottesbrooke is situated . But she was writing Mansfield Park-which was set in Northamptonshire in the main- when she asked her sister Cassandra’s advice as to whether Northamptonshire was a place of hedgerows.
And it is probable that Cassandra in turn asked their well-connected bother Henry Austen about this burning question, for he was familiar with both Northamptonshire and Cottesbrook Hall, being a friend of the Langham family who owned it at that time. So it is possible that Henry’s talk of the Langhams and their beautiful home and park might have made some impression on her ;-)
It certainly qualifies as a baronet’s house, for Sir James Langham, the owner at that time was a baronet.
That’s as maybe…..So it was with a happy and not a hungry heart ( now , come on and relax, I’m really not going to try and incorporate too many Bruce-related puns here. Promise!) that we arrived there today for a specialist plant fair.
We also toured the gardens which are delightful,and I think you might care to accompany us to view them too.
First we saw the Statue Walk….
And within it was a wonderful specimen cornus tree….
If only mine looked that good…….
It also had some ethereal herbaceous borders…
We wandered along the Gladiator Alle
…to look out across the Ha-Ha( hmm….) to the Plane Tree Allee.
And then across into the Spinney Garden.
To the Philosophers Garden( I think these roses were hybrid musks)
The Pool Garden……
The Dutch Garden….
And the wonderful Cedars of Lebanon towards the front of the house,
18th century examples of which usually signify support for the Jacobite cause ( if that was the case then I’m certain Our Miss Austen would have approved).
The terrace was probably my favourite spot…
Oh look! Another Magnolia Grandiflora!
And we speculated as to the possibilities of Cottesbrooke being Mansfield.
After much thought and careful consideration, over couscous and prawns ,we felt it might have a chance,
with its fabulously retired setting( in the middle of a haze of unclassified roads)…
with its parkland, classical bridge
and lake, complete with swans and the spire of a local church acting as a focal point in the distance, it was surely a scene of which Fanny and Edmund would have approved… could this distant spire be the church at Thornton Lacey?
But best of all, Mrs Norris was nowhere to be seen. Not even scuttling off, carrying a roll of green baize under her arm….;-)










































































































































































































